Mr. Weston is a supporting
character
Character or Characters may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Literature
* ''Character'' (novel), a 1936 Dutch novel by Ferdinand Bordewijk
* ''Characters'' (Theophrastus), a classical Greek set of character sketches attributed to The ...
in
Jane Austen
Jane Austen (; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique, and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots of ...
's novel ''
Emma
Emma may refer to:
* Emma (given name)
Film
* Emma (1932 film), ''Emma'' (1932 film), a comedy-drama film by Clarence Brown
* Emma (1996 theatrical film), ''Emma'' (1996 theatrical film), a film starring Gwyneth Paltrow
* Emma (1996 TV film), '' ...
'', written in 1815. He marries the governess of the heroine,
Emma Woodhouse
Emma Woodhouse is the 21-year-old protagonist of Jane Austen's 1815 novel '' Emma''. She is described in the novel's opening sentence as "handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and a happy disposition... and had lived nearly twenty-on ...
, and it is the arrival of his son, Frank Churchill, in Highbury that sets the events of the plot in motion.
Background
Born into a local Highbury family, rising from trade into gentility – what
Ronald Blythe
Ronald George Blythe (born 6 November 1922)["Dr Ronald Blythe ...](_blank)
called “the park-like nirvana...the comic idealization of the country gentleman state” - Mr Weston used a small inheritance to seek an upwardly mobile short-cut, joining the militia as a Captain, and wooing and winning the daughter of a rich landed family, the Churchills. Unfortunately the pair were then disowned by the Churchills, and his wife's extravagance whittled away his fortune; until her death, and the handing over of their child to the Churchills, led him to join his brothers in trade in London.
Some decades later, financial success enabled him both to purchase a small estate, and to maintain the gentry lifestyle – wife, servants, carriage, hospitality, and fine wines - on the interest of his savings alone.
Character
A shrewd, cheerful, lively and hospitable figure, Mr. Weston is liked by one and all in Highbury: the only reservations expressed about him relate to his preference for society in general over strong family ties, and (on Emma's part) to a certain unrestricted sociability on his part.
[R. Blythe ed, ''Jane Austen: Emma'' (Penguin 1973) Ch 38 p. 317-8]
See also
*
Cheeryble Brothers
*''
Mr Weston's Good Wine''
References
External links
Mr. Weston quotations
{{Emma
Emma characters
Literary characters introduced in 1815
Fictional gentry